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NORTHBRIDGE, Mass. - Six Northbridge runners will be taking on the Boston Marathon's infamous 26.2 mile course today, running in a field of 27,000 entrants.
Runners in the 116th Boston Marathon will be enduring what is considered one of the most difficult marathon routes in the world due to its winding course and challenging hills along the route from Hopkinton to Boston.
Adding to the courses difficulty this year will be the weather, forecast to be unseasonably warm and dry - pleasant for spectatators, potentially deadly for runners who are being advised that if the temperatures reach certain levels, running will put even the most fit athletes at risk for heat injury.
Inexperienced marathoners are being advised not to run.
Starting times for the Marathon are staggered: Wheelchair start is 9:22 a.m., Elite Women start at 9:32 a.m., Elite Men and Wave 1 start at 10 a.m. and Wave 2 is at 10:20 a.m.
Northbridge runners are:
John T. Brown,54, bib number 2065
Henry Chosta III, 42, bib number 7460
Ronald B. Gove, 47, bib number 25757
Christopher Lachapelle, 33, bib number 25872
Paul Reilly, 32, bib number 194
Bill Balloy, 60, bib number 19726
Also running, but as a bandit without a bib number, is Peter McNeil, 36, of Fowler Avenue, part of a group calling themselves "Bandits for Malia.’’
They’ll be wearing pink, the favorite color of 3-year-old Malia Dakota Jusczyk, the daughter of Glen and Meghan (Lytle) Jusczyk, who was diagnosed on April 1, 2011 with stage IV neuroblastoma, an aggressive cancer that had spread into her bones and bone marrow.
Read Malia's story here: http://www.thedailynorthbridge.com/news/boston-marathon-2012-join-bandits-malia
Comments (1)
Good Luck Pete!